


Better Than to Breed

by feyestwords



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst, Children, Domestic Fluff, F/F, Family, Grief/Mourning, Hannibal Lecter Being an Asshole, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Parenthood, Post-Episode: s03e07 Digestivo, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Pregnancy, Will is a Mess
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-29
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-08-18 10:49:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8159498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feyestwords/pseuds/feyestwords
Summary: Will learns what happened to his & Margot’s baby. Alana learns she is pregnant. Years later, Will & Hannibal welcome home a newborn, and learn to navigate the ups and downs of having children of their own.





	1. Chapter 1

It was warm that morning. Warmer than yesterday, than the weeks, the months before. Spring settled quiet atop Wolf Trap, gradual enough to be missed if you didn’t pay attention. Sky regaining a bluish hue, tinting the gray. Bright. Cool winds. The birds had migrated back, settling into the trees around Will’s property. Buster darted after one, paws splashing through wet patches of melting snow, muddying his fur. Winston followed, then the others, a mad pursuit, some with their paws braced against the tree, barking up at a sparrow.

It didn’t feel as good as it should have, having his dogs back. Will sat on the stairs of his porch, elbows on knees, head in tired hands. Eyelids heavy from too much sleep. A fevered chill stuck to his skin. He squinted up towards the sky, estimating that he had slept until about noon. A tiny pang of guilt that his dogs had to wait so long. Winston had tried to wake him a few times, an eager lick at the side of his face. Each time he’d rolled over, faced the other direction.

Alana wasn’t coming today, Will decided, nodding once to himself. Bones cracking as he stood. It was probably for the best.

She had taken to coming to his house every other Friday morning. Busy work schedule, she claimed, otherwise she’d come more often. She was up for Chilton’s old position and had a lot of “board meetings to attend.” The words sounded flat and awkward coming out of her mouth. Both she & Will knew it, but neither said anything. Will couldn’t complain. Her visits were, admittedly, needed. He hadn’t spoken to anyone since the end of the trial, and as good as they were, his dogs were hardly a substitute for human interaction.

The visits were sweet, at first. She’d show up in the early morning, sometimes with coffee, breakfast. Walk for a while with him, his dogs. She’d ask about his visits with Jack, insisting to Will _‘He shouldn’t make you talk about him if you don’t want to.’_

Alana never said his name. Will often found himself amused by the way she danced around it, as if it might set him off.

She would skip an “every other Friday” or two here and there, claiming meetings, illness. At first he missed her absence, but then, when she’d show up on a Saturday with an unusual air of obligation, Will began to resent Alana’s presence. Her questions about how well he was eating, how much he was drinking, how he was feeling. No more walks in the woods, smiles on their faces as the dogs ran circles around them. Now it was… a meeting. Something in a calendar, something she made up if she missed. Impersonal. Ingeuine.

It might have just been the isolation getting to him. But one afternoon Alana brought a well-intentioned casserole, and Will noticed the way her face changed when he joked that he was not _“Hannibal Lecter’s widow”_ and she could _“stop taking care of me like I am.”_

That was over a month ago. Alana hadn’t been by since.

Will walked down off his porch, mud squelching under his shoes. He bent down, and patted Henry as he trotted by. Body stiff, each movement a dull ache. It was nice, in a way, to know he didn’t have to prepare for company today. No need to perform, to show that he was sane, that he was coping. He thought, momentarily, of giving Alana a call, telling her that she needn’t visit at all anymore. Realized, quickly, that that would likely prompt a visit, and decided against it.

He swallowed something bitter. Meandered further and further away from his house, dogs running circles around him.

The sun grew warmer overhead as the day crawled on. Cloudless blue, snow turning to slush, flooding the fields. He was grateful when they reached the cover of the trees, branches shielding the ground from sun, and he could again walk through unmelted snow. He whistled for his dogs when some strayed too far, but most of them knew the way, yards in front of him, sniffing along the ground as they walked.

The stream was flowing. Will heard the gentle static of bubbling water as they approached. Patches of ice still clung to the shore here and there, water flowing fast around them. Buster jumped in, then promptly out, shaking vigorously.

“Too cold?”

Buster stood, pawing at Will’s leg. He sat on the fallen log where he usually did whenever he came to this spot, scooping Buster up into his arms. He held him to his chest, wet fur soaking his clothes, piercing cold.

The sun slid across the sky and a patch of light found Will, warming the top of his head, his shoulders. Harley and Zoe wrestled in a patch of snow. Ellie used her paw to splash at a stick drifting near the shore.

This was where he came to be happy. He should be happy.

He’d sit and watch the way the light bounced off rushing water, when days went right and he wanted to savor them, to revel in fleeting contentment. When days went wrong, and he needed a moment away, to himself, to think, the tranquil drone of the stream muted the rest of the world.

Everything seemed muted now. He felt, all at once, heavy and light. As if he might float away or be sucked into the crushing earth. Will hung above his body, staring down at himself, a second out of sync with reality. His fingers ran over the scar where Buster’s fur didn’t grow anymore. 

Somehow, in some twisted way, this was all Hannibal’s fault.

The fact that this, right now, what was once considered “normal life” was more of an “after,” was his fault. Will hated how much it all still affected him. Hated, every day, how he felt like a dead man, haunting the grounds, the house, where he lost his mind.

Will scowled. _No._ Stood up.

He would not allow Hannibal into his head. Not here. This was a place Hannibal was not allowed to touch.

Spring settled in and stuck. Will hated the warmer days. The cold gave him an excuse to stay indoors, but now the sun burnt through his flimsy rationalizations, shone a harsh light on his state of mind. He spent his days crafting lures and not fishing. Reading. Drinking. Mostly drinking, waiting for the lengthened days to end, the daylight to leave him be.

Jack called as the sun set one evening, asking in monotone how Will had been doing, rushing through awkward pleasantries before telling Will that two young couples had been found mutilated in Delaware. Something in Will’s chest cracked, and he laughed as he hung up the phone.

Jack didn’t call again.

His house, his bones, grew dusty. Everything that was once comforting and familiar felt strange. Wrong. An unnamed emptiness. He tried, for a while, to blame it on the lack of human contact. Went on one date with a woman and decided, no, that wasn’t it, and decided not to contact her again. Drank himself to sleep.

The dogs woke Will up the next morning, chorus of frantic barks sharp and painful in his ears, head spinning as he sat up, squinting out his window. He spotted the black car in his driveway at the same moment as he heard a knock on his door. No doubt they’d already seen him, so he stood, walked to the door, pajamas and dark circles.

Margot Verger regarded the sight of him with raised eyebrows. The dogs rushed around her, bounding towards the field.

“Did I wake you?”

Soft features and sharp angles, a high black collar, a dark leather bag. Will blinked a few times, not sure if he was awake.

“What are you doing here, Margot?”

She shifted the weight of the bag on her shoulder. “Alana sent me.”

Will’s eyebrows shot up. “Did she?”

Margot cleared her throat quietly. “Yes.” Moving as if she meant to enter. Will stood in the doorway, not intentionally blocking her, but not letting her inside. He moved only when she asked, in slow and measured syllables,

“Are you going to invite me inside?”

Will nodded once, curt. Stepped to the side. Eyed his dogs and closed the door.

Margot stood, stiff and awkward on the threshold, not quite sure where to move. A prickling heat rose in Will’s cheeks, noticing, for the first time in weeks, the state of his house.

“Uh,” he moved quick and awkward, snatching a coat off one of his chairs, moving a pile of books off another. “Here, sorry, I haven’t… I didn’t know you were coming.”

Margot nodded, not really listening. “Whiskey?”

“Asking or offering?”

“Asking.”

Will ran a hand through his hair, head pounding beneath his palm. “I don’t know, it’s…” he realized, halfway through the sentence, that he didn’t have the slightest idea what time it was. “…morning.”

Margot’s eyes widened. “It’s afternoon.” Glanced at his bed, the disheveled state of it. “Did you just wake up?”

The words hung in the air and Will had no answer to them, the shock of her visit turning quick to annoyance. He ignored her, walking to the kitchen, fetching two glasses and a bottle. “If Alana was this concerned about me, she could have called herself.”

Margot cast a thoughtful glance upwards. “True.” Will poured two sizeable glasses, extended one to Margot who took it with silent fingers. “I’ll admit that I’m not… entirely here on her behalf.”

She looked to Will, eyes on his face, as if she were studying what impact, if any, the words had. Will responded by gesturing to the chair beside her. She sat slow, placing her bag with unnecessary care next to it on the floor. Her eyes were on her glass, tilting back and forth, both palms wrapped around it. Will tossed back half of his drink. Waited for Margot to speak, to clarify. A few moments of uncomfortable silence ticked by before Will got impatient.

“Why are you here, Margot.” Flat. Defensive. 

“You want me to cut right to the chase?” Margot spoke over her glass, bottom lip pressed against the rim.

“I’ve done away with pleasantries nowadays.”

Margot smiled. “Fair enough.” Continued, knowingly, with blatant pleasantries. “How are you? I never saw you at the trial, I was only there for my own testimony.”

Will sniffed, eyes on his whiskey. Margot knew perfectly well how he was, sleeping until the afternoon, unkempt hair and wrinkled pajama pants, empty bottle of whiskey on the floor beside the bed. “I’m coping.”

Margot seemed satisfied with this answer. “We all are, in our own ways.” Sipped. “I’m coping, every day, with what happened at the farm. After Alana and I released Hannibal.”

Will’s eyes closed of their own volition, an unconscious reaction. He exhaled, forced them open.

“I feel a lot of guilt for that.” Slender fingers, bloodred nails tapping against the glass. “But Hannibal saved your life. And turned himself in, so… I don’t ever find myself feeling too poorly about it.”

Will had apparently lost all conscious control of his expression. He felt his lips pulled into a smile. It was nice having someone not dance around him, never mentioning what happened, as if he were frail and would break at the sheer memory.

“I don’t feel any guilt over what happened to my brother.”

The smile fell from Will’s face. Margot’s was stone. Unreadable. 

Will prompted, an eyebrow raised. “Happened?”

Margot’s expression matched his. “What _I_ did to my brother.” A short, amused exhale at Will’s correction. She sipped once more. “There’s going to be an heir. Hannibal helped assure that. And now with Mason out of the picture, I can move on with my life.”

Will tilted his glass back in one swift movement, finishing his drink.

Margot pursed her lips, spending a moment in thought before continuing.

“I got my closure…” the stress on specific syllables gave her sentence a particular meaning. Will leaned forward in his chair, spoke again to correct her.

“Yes, and I got mine.”

Margot tilted her head. “Did you?”

Will held the empty glass tight in his fingers. Defensive. He didn’t know about what. “Yes. He’s put away, he’s going to be... away, forever. That was always the end goal.”

“And you feel good about that,” a question in the form of a statement. “Right? You feel like you can move on?”

Will did nothing to hide his scowl. The appreciation for her honesty began to wan, annoyance again taking hold, tainting his words as they left his mouth. “Why are you here, Margot?”

Her eyes were in her lap. She finished her drink. ”There’s something I still haven’t quite found… closure on. Alana and I talked about this, since we’re going to-”

She stopped. Deliberated. Continued. “She thinks telling you would help.”

Will sat back in his chair. “Why would you think I’d be able to help you?”

“It’s about you.” She grew visibly uncomfortable now, spine straightening. She placed her glass on the table next to the chair. “Us, actually…. Our baby.”

Will frowned, the memory unexpectedly unpleasant. “What about it?”

“There’s… no easy or delicate way to put this, so I’m just going to say it.” Margot placed her hands on her knees, squeezing. “When Mason did… what he did to me, he terminated the pregnancy. He didn’t terminate the fetus.”

Will blinked. Mind not quite there yet.

Margot breathed. In, out. Steadying. Continued, speaking a bit faster, as though the quicker the explanation the less painful it would be. “He took the baby and implanted it in a surrogate. It lived to term. It didn’t live long after that.”

Will stopped breathing.

Margot bit down on her lip. “He... Mason. He left the baby in a pig for me to find. That night.”

A heavy exhale. “Christ.”

Will pressed into his eyes with the pads of his fingers, blackening out the world. Rubbed his palm over his face. _Too much._ This was too much all at once. His own voice sounded far off, muffled by the deafening pounding of his heart against his ribs. He tried, frantic, to force horrific images out of his head, bombarding him from all sides. Wondering if the reality was as gruesome as what he pictured. Knowing that, with Mason as mastermind, it likely was.

“Jesus, Margot, I… I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for. Other than the initial… act, you haven’t done anything.”

Will looked up, met Margot’s gaze. She kept her emotions well guarded behind a blank expression, patient, studying Will’s face just as intensely as he studied hers, neither completely able to understand the other. Still, there was a calm, comfortable sense of understanding that permeated the horror. Will latched onto it, basked in it for a few moments and allowed it to fill him up, tried to use it to drown the sense of crushing dread he felt in the pit of his stomach.

Will blinked. Margot mirrored. Both waiting for the other to speak.

“Then why… why tell me?” Will, sitting forward. Elbows on knees. “If I had such a small role, why come here and tell me this?”

Margot nodded to herself, eyes on a spot on the wall over Will’s shoulder. She settled on her words, spoke them confident and clear. “You were… close with Alana, and every time she came to talk to you, it felt like we were keeping some horrible secret.”

Will chewed the inside of his cheek. Margot continued.

“It was hanging over my head. I need to move on, Will. I’ll never forget him but I need to let go of my grief.”

Will’s breath caught on something in his throat. His eyes stung.

“Him?”

Margot’s guard splintered, face softening.

“A boy?”

She spoke in a whisper. “Yes. ”

Will shuddered with his inhale. “God…”

“There’s something else.”

Will felt every muscle in his body tense at once. His eyes locked onto Margot’s hands as they reached for the bag she’d placed on the ground next to her, tracking every minor movement. She pulled it up onto her lap, undoing the latches, slow and deliberate. Produced, from within it, an impossibly tiny container.

An urn.

Will’s lungs filled to burst.

“I had him cremated.” Margot’s words met his ears through a filter of buzzing static. Eyes locked onto the container, sleek black stone, pale fingers wrapped around it. “I couldn’t stand the thought of a tiny casket, so… I have half his ashes at the estate, and…” She trailed off into silence.

Will realized. Looked back up at Margot. “No, Margot that’s… that’s too much.”

“Will,”

“I can’t just-“

“Will, please.” Her words loud and sudden. She took a breath, eyes closed. “It’s… important to me. It feels right that you have them.”

Will’s lips slightly parted. Exasperated. Overwhelmed. Margot extended it, in one hand, to him.

He took it. It was heavier than expected, smooth, cold.

Small. So, _so_ incredibly small.

“You can keep them, or, if you have somewhere you’d like to spread them, you can…”

She trailed off when she realized Will wasn’t listening. He rolled the urn around in his hands, feeling everything he’d ever felt all at once. At his core, an unnamed, white hot… something. Searing, buried under the other emotions pouring into him, over him. 

Squeezed his eyes. Shook his head.

“Thank you, Margot.”

She looked, at least, for a moment, content. “I’m moving on, Will. Not forgetting, but moving on. Living my life. You should too. At least… try. Alana worries about you.”

Will swallowed the bitter response at the front of his throat. “I will.”

Margot stood, picking up her bag. “It was nice to see you, Will.”

“Thank you for coming by, Margot.”

She nodded, once, the air in the room suddenly thick, and moved towards the door. One hand on the handle before Will interrupted her.

“Do you ever…” Will wanted to stop the words. He wanted to, so desperately, but they came all the same, stumbling into the air. “...miss… him?” Too pleading, too obvious. Margot looked at Will in a way that made him want to shrink into himself.

“Mason?” Pity in her expression like spit on Will’s cheek. “No, I don’t.”

Margot stepped out the door without another word, Will standing in the empty space she left behind, the unnamed something burning a hole through his intestines, melting his bones.

The dogs accompanied him on his walk. Blissfully unaware of the heavy cloud that hung overhead, making Will cold in the warm dusk. The ground was firm, now, stalks killed by the snow breaking the earth and reaching for the sun. Sky shades of dull orange, dark blue hanging over the trees in the distance. Winston trotting at his side.

The stream didn’t look as dull as it had a few weeks ago. Glistening current reflecting the sunset splashed overhead, framed by bright green on either side. He didn’t think of his shoes, his clothes as he waded in. Forgetting, when a shiver shot through his body, how cold the water actually was, despite the warmth of the night. He looked up, eyes on two violently pink clouds that floated by.

It was inappropriately beautiful. He waded further into the quiet of the stream. Sun warmed black stone in his palms. 

It was one of the worst feelings, finding out he was going to be a father. Never in his life had he felt such intense panic, a wild and desperate need to put a stop to it. Eventually, panic faded to an ache, a want that he had felt only in passing before, whenever he dreamed of Abigail. A want that nearly broke him when the baby was taken away. A want, he prayed, for the sake of the world, he would never feel again. The children Will imagined himself begetting had no place on this earth.

Will felt it now, rushing around his limbs, warming his skin, his muscles against the cold of the stream. He blinked down at the urn, tried and failed to stop thinking of what ifs. Swallowed.

It was better this way. But the want followed him home all the same, sticking to his skin, tugging at his dreams.


	2. Chapter 2

Alana’s bladder woke before her. She tried, warm, comfortable, half conscious, to ignore it, but a moment of lucidity caused her to remember why she had gotten up at two in the morning to drink a full glass of water. Her eyes flicked open, mind slamming into consciousness.

She rolled over, reaching out, and her fingers met soft skin. Palm gripping a bare shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze.

“Margot.”

“Mmm.”

Soft but firm. “Margot I’m going to take it.” Sitting up, pulling back sheets and swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Margot shifted, sighing into the pillow.

“Ok, wait for me.”

Alana, standing, muscles pulling tight in her legs, sleep still clutching at her body. Her stomach jumped, urgency lighting up her spine. “I’ll try.” Shrugging on her robe. “No, actually, I might pee myself if I wait. Hurry up.”

She paced to the bathroom, quick, a calm control of her movements as she ripped open the kit, grabbed the cup she’d placed by the sink. She was still peeing when Margot appeared in the door, hair pulled up into a messy bun, halfway through a yawn.

“I might have overdone it.” Alana, careful, precarious, trying not to spill as she placed the cup on the counter.

Margot’s sleepy laugh. “You practically drank half a gallon.”

“Well, I wanted to be sure.” Alana speaking through a smile. “You get the most accurate results early in the morning.” A light warmth tingled through her limbs, into her hands, her fingers. Miniscule trembles as she dipped the stick into the cup, and placed it, careful, onto the counter.

Margot, silent, strode over to Alana, sat across from her on the edge of the bathtub. Neither spoke. Alana’s eyes fixed to the tiny plastic window of the stick. Margot’s hand on Alana’s leg, running gentle, reassuring, up and down the length of her thigh. The first line turned blue. Alana sat up straighter, tucked a flyaway behind her ear. Waited, foot tapping against the floor, for the second line.

Waited. And waited. And waited. 

“Well?”

Alana’s head snapped up, to Margot, then back down at the stick, as if she might miss something in the half second she tore her eyes away.

_That can’t be._

She grabbed the test, stood, held it underneath the light above the mirror and studied it close, eyes squinted.

Nothing. No line. Not even the faintest hint of a line.

Alana’s arms fell to her sides. She let the test fall from limp fingers onto the counter. The warmth had left her, the excitement of anticipation. She felt, wholly and unexpectedly, hollow, as though her lungs, her heart had vanished from her chest.

Deafening silence. Then, “I was so sure this time…”

Margot appeared behind her in the mirror and Alana realized that she had been staring at her own reflection. Arms slipped over hers, fingers gliding down forearms, hands, lacing between her own. Margot pulled her tight, resting her chin where Alana’s neck met her shoulder.

“Are you ok?”

Her voice, the warmth of her skin, her soft breath, and Alana could feel her chest slowly filling again. 

“Yes, I’m fine. I’m just… surprised.”

Margot nodded. “You seemed pretty confident.”

Alana nodded as well, eyes fixed at a random spot on the sink. “I was.” She leaned into Margot, face against face. “What do we do?”

“Well…” Margot rocked slow from side to side, moving Alana with her. “We try again. Third time’s the charm.”

The hollow feeling came creeping back, manifested itself in Alana’s words. Bitter, flat. “It’s not like we have an unlimited amount of sperm.”

Margot’s arms left hers. Alana turned to face her and found nothing but warmth in soft eyes and parted lips. Still, the room felt cold. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. Margot placed a hand on the side of her face.

“I love you. And we’ll figure this out. Ok? Try not to be too upset.”

A deep, heavy breath. “I know. I love you too. I just… I really could have used this. Today of all days.”

Her meeting loomed ominous in the early afternoon, a dark and opaque cloud over her day. It would be her first time seeing him in months, the first visit to his cell since the trial.

“I know.” Margot nodding slow. “It would have been nice. But you’ll be ok. And now you can have a glass of wine or three with me when you get home.”

Alana smiled. “I like the sound of ‘or three’.” 

Margot leaned forward, a quick and lovely kiss. “You should get dressed. Don’t want to be late.”

The morning was still dark when Alana pulled out of the driveway. Cold, colder the farther she drove. The Verger estate shrunk in her rearview mirror before disappearing behind a line of trees, with it, Alana’s hopeless but overwhelming desire to stay home with Margot all day. Her thoughts swarmed around her head, echoing off the sides of the car, clouding her vision. Margot and Hannibal, swirled together, clashing, colliding.

_She could decide to find a surrogate that isn’t me. It’d be the most practical option at this point after two failed attempts. Why does he want so badly to talk to me? What could he possibly have to say? She’d be right to. I couldn’t blame her but I just wish I could give her what she needs. If he tries to pull anything at all, I’m walking away._

At least her buzzing thoughts busied her commute, distracted her from the nagging emptiness. She hardly noticed she had arrived until she pulled robotic into her parking space, knuckles white from her grip around the steering wheel.

A deep breath. Another, and another. There were four hours until her agreed upon meeting time. Four hours. She could do four hours.

Unusually bitter coffee. An obnoxious ray of light landing right across her face as she sat at her desk. She snapped a bit too harshly at an overly enthusiastic journalist who had, somehow, managed to get an appointment with her. The minutes dragged themselves reluctantly by. Alana spent a large portion of them pacing. She didn’t know why being pregnant would have helped this. The fulfillment, maybe? The joy it would have brought her, the surge of confidence to quiet the tiny tremors she pretended not to feel. She tapped her fingers on her desk. On a whim, opened the surveillance stream on her computer.

Hannibal sat on his bed, cross-legged, against the wall. Eyes closed.

She closed it, quick. Too quick. Took her thousandth deep breath of the day. He’d know, in a second, if she was nervous. Use it against her. Alana rubbed at her eyes, leaned back in her chair. She wouldn’t let him. She refused to give him anything. Nothing about this situation should have him feeling like he was in any control at all.

She opened her eyes. Realized the mistake that was allowing Hannibal to pick the meeting time. Decided, in a dizzying rush of assurance, to take that decision from him. Got up. Strode out of her office and down the hall.

“Ma’am?” A guard outside the door, eyeing her with a slight frown.

Determined. “Tell Bowman to observe the feed. Record everything.”

One curt nod. “Ma’am.” He stepped aside, bending his head down to his radio, repeating the orders into it. The other guard, at her gesture, pulled the door open for her.

The tremors returned in full force, shooting into her arms, her legs, squeezing the muscles in her shoulders. Alana ignored them as she walked, long, confident strides, clicking of her heels echoing loud off the glass.

He didn’t even open his eyes.

“Hello, Alana. You’re early.”

She didn’t allow her voice, her body, her face, to betray the icy chill that filled her stomach, the horrific paralysis coiling around her at the mere sight of him.

“I decided to move our appointment.” Bored and indifferent. “I have a busy afternoon.” As if to say she had better and more important things in her life than Hannibal Lecter. Knowing full well how much that would bother him.

His eyes flicked open. Alana, silent, forced her breathing to stay slow. He got up from his bed, walked to the glass. Mirroring the way Alana stood tall, shoulders wide.

Despite the glass, the cameras, the guards, she knew she was totally and completely exposed. Hannibal did too. He looked annoyingly amused.

“I’ll get to the point, then.”

“Please do.”

“I’d like to request some reading material, if I may.”

Alana’s eyebrows shot up. She thought of laughing, but decided against it. Too patronizing, too childish.

“And what makes you think you have the right?”

“I don’t claim to have the right to anything. I’m simply making a formal request.” He put up his hands in mock-defeat. Words light and friendly. Casual. The hair on Alana’s arms stood up, goosebumps thankfully concealed under her blazer. 

“I see.” She nodded slow, pretending to deliberate. She paced to one side of the room, then back to the center. Hannibal’s unblinking eyes tracking every minor movement. “And why do you think I’d let you have anything at all?”

Hannibal sighed, eyes on the ceiling. “Well, if I’m going to be here for the rest of my life, I’d like some way to stay sharp. I can’t imagine it would be much fun for either of us to sit her and watch me grow old and dull.”

A scowl creased Alana’s face. “Nothing about this will ever be ‘fun,’ Hannibal. It’s not supposed to be. It’s prison.”

“Of course. Forgive my poor choice of words.”

Alana’s scowl remained, her arms rigid at her sides. Hannibal’s eyes ran up and down the length of her body, studying its language.

“I can offer you information, in exchange.”

Alana said nothing. Mind flipping through thousands of possibilities but landing on none.

Hannibal filled the pause. “If you want.”

“What information could you possibly give to us that wasn’t revealed in the trial?”

Hannibal smiled to himself and Alana felt overwhelmingly small. 

“I revealed as little information as possible during the trial.”

“You revealed a _lot,_ Hannibal.”

“There is far more yet uncovered.” He paced now, hands grasped behind his back. “Not just grisly details. Useful information. Wouldn’t you like to know what techniques I used on Miriam Lass?”

Alana did everything she could to not let show how much she actually did want to know. Straightened her spine. Stood centimeters taller.

“And you’d willingly give that information in exchange for a few books?”

Hannibal nodded. “I have a list.”

Alana chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment. It was an… oddly reasonable proposal. “What’s the catch?”

“No catch. No agenda.”

“You always have an agenda.”

“Not this time.”

Now, Alana allowed herself to laugh. “Forgive me if I find that hard to believe.”

Hannibal inclined his head. “You may find it hard to believe, but it is the truth.”

It was certainly an interesting proposal. Had he been anyone but himself, Alana would have been tempted to take it. Still, there was something so eerily sinister about him. The way he walked, folded his hands, the way his eyes meandered casually around the room, talking to Alana as though they were still friends and colleagues. The calm, the cooperation. Even if he was fully sincere, and there was no more to this plot than the exchange of goods and information… it was an exchange on his terms, for something he desired. It’d be giving him what he wanted, a win.

Everything in Alana screamed no. But a tiny corner of the back of her skull yelled over the fray. _How did you pull off Miriam Lass?_

Alana frowned. Began pacing once more.

“There are ways for me to get that information from you, you know.”

Hannibal cocked his head. “They won’t work.”

Voice wavering with a slight chuckle. “You may be fairly confident with your ability to hold your tongue, but I doubt you can chemically resist a healthy dose of sodium amytal.”

She didn’t mean it. But Hannibal might not know that. There was a shift in his demeanor, slight enough that by anyone else it might have gone unnoticed.

“Hm. I thought the end of Chilton’s reign would bring change.”

Alana stopped pacing. Turned to face him. Close now, inches from the glass, from him.

“How very _dull_ , Alana.”

Her skin grew hot, anger simmering low in her throat. 

“Someone will be by tomorrow to collect your list.” Standing tall, speaking stern. “I will think about it. No promises.”

“Thank you, Alana.”

“It's Dr. Bloom.”

He smiled at her correction. Her skin grew hotter, more uncomfortable. Alana turned on her heel, taking a few strides towards the door, intending on putting a close to the conversation, when,

“Dr. Bloom?”

She stopped. Sighed, visibly, letting her shoulders rise and drop. Turned.

“I can’t let you go without extending my sincerest congratulations.”

Alana frowned. “What?”

“I said congratulations. And give my regards to Margot as well. You’ll make excellent mothers.” 

She turned. Slow. Forgoing any attempt at composure. Brows low, eyes narrowed, lips parted slightly. The anger in her throat bubbled over, muddling her words. They came in a forced whisper, taking measured steps towards the glass.

“Are you _mocking_ me?”

“Mocking you about what, Alana?”

She didn’t correct him. She didn’t notice. “About-“ Stopped.

_How could he possibly know?_

Alana opened her mouth to speak. Closed it. Her heart beat heavy and loud, filling the entirety of her chest, quickening by the second.

Hannibal stood calm and patient, unnervingly kind eyes searching Alana’s expression.

“You think I’m pregnant.”

“I know you’re pregnant.”

“How?”

“I can smell it.”

Alana took a few more steps forward. Silent. Up to the glass, right in front of it, squared off against Hannibal. She said nothing, every mechanism of thought had short-circuited, every cell in her body shook while she stood stone still. Hannibal tilted his head, bending down slightly, face in front of one of the holes in the glass. Inhaling. Deep, slow. Intimate.

“Six weeks.”

Alana exhaled, shaky, unaware she had been holding her breath. Everything flooded her at once, crashing into her limbs, whole and wonderful and terrifying. She turned from Hannibal, back to the glass, head ducked down. Trying and failing to think, to catch her breath. She needed to leave. She needed to tell Margot.

She needed to get herself, her baby, as far away from the creature behind her as she possibly could.

“I detect a hormone imbalance.” Hannibal continued as though the whole world hadn’t just changed. “Nothing monumental. It’s the least of your worries, in fact.”

Alana’s lungs grew small.

“What?”

She turned. Hannibal looked far too pleased.

“What exactly? Is there something wrong with the baby?” Frantic, forgetting the necessity of composure. The word _'baby'_ rolled heavy off her tongue and made everything so overwhelmingly _real._

“Not yet.” Head tilted slightly to the side. “I imagine things will appear perfectly normal for quite some time. Years, perhaps. Before…”

“Before what?”

“Oh, Alana.” Sweet. “Don’t you know?”

Her heart stopped when she realized she did. The nightmares, the sickening thoughts she couldn’t help but entertain the moment she and Margot started trying to conceive. An entirely unnatural sickness took hold of her stomach, a clammy wave of nausea throughout her body. The thought cast a monstrous shadow over the moment, snuffing out the dim flicker of joy she had felt barely a minute prior. Hannibal continued, somewhere far away from Alana, his voice echoing around the chambers of her head. 

“I imagine your child will be but five or six when it starts taking an interest in harming the horses. A few years after that it will turn its attention to any other children you might have. Or you.”

Closer, louder. Alana reminded herself to keep her breathing regular. Her eyes fixed on Hannibal’s face, sliding in an out of focus. She fixed on his words, used his voice to pull herself back to reality. 

“Just because it’s Mason’s child doesn’t mean it’ll be anything like him.”

Hannibal smirked. “Doesn’t it?”

“It doesn’t.”

“The child of a murder, raised by two murderers.”

A new sort of horror filled Alana. This one white hot, prickling under her skin.

“Quite a gruesome family you’ve built for yourself, Dr. Bloom.”

Scorching the surface. He’d gotten to her, quick and easy, as if she were a plaything for him to amuse himself with. It was her fault, too. She knew it. She’d let him in, allowed herself a moment of emotional honesty, vulnerability, when she should have shown him nothing but flat indifference. It angered her, watching him stand with his shoulders back, face up, tall, proud of the way he could make her squirm.

Inhale. Alana took hold of the rage the coursed through her veins and with it, built a wall. Exhale. She was pregnant. She could give Margot everything they wanted. This was the beginning of their life, the security of their future. Alana pictured how Margot might look once she told her. Refused to let Hannibal take that from her.

“Gruesome, perhaps. But a family all the same.”

Hannibal’s bemused face became replaced by hesitant curiosity.

“I’ve been working hard to build this family, Hannibal. I’m going to continue to work for them.” She spoke slow. “I can’t imagine doing to them what you did to the family you so hard worked to build.”

Hannibal froze.

Alana took a step forward. Then another.

“You worked hard. For a while.” Whispering now, harsh. “But they didn’t love you in the way you needed them to. So you threw them away. And look what’s happened to you.”

“I’m here of my own accord.”

“I wasn’t talking about your imprisonment.” 

His eyes turned black.

Alana’s smile felt so perfectly petty. “My family is my world Hannibal, and in whatever _‘gruesome’_ way it manifests itself… I will adapt. Because I love them, and they love me.”

“That’s a bit premature of an assumption, don’t you think?”

“No. And you know how I know?" She tilted her head. "Because unlike you,” Leaning in. Barely audible. “I am capable of being loved.”

A horrid rage flashed underneath Hannibal’s still expression and Alana turned on her heel, long and confident strides towards the exit.

She’d forgotten about his request for books until she reached her office and pulled up the live feed. He stood in the exact spot where she had left him, arms limp at his sides. He paced for a minute or two before sitting down on the edge of his bed, elbow on knees, head in his hands.

Alana smiled.

She rested her palm against her lower belly, tried to feel the life that was there. She knew, of course, that she couldn’t, but the awareness alone was enough to fill her with warmth. To stave off, if only for a moment, the very real fear that inside her grew a monster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always, not super pleased but i have to post it or else i never will.
> 
> NEXT CHAPTER: Years after the fall, Hannibal & Will welcome home their second child.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm not totally happy with this, but i have to let it go @ some point!
> 
> next chapter: Alana goes to visit Hannibal at the start of his incarceration.
> 
> (chapter 3: gross domestic hannigram fluff, post twotl)


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